Liberating Eden
by Dear Aunt Elladora
Summary: Andromeda's reasoning behind her decision to seperate herself from her family is examined. (QuickEdit has died, so no Author's Note)


Sometimes life feels like a dream  
  
And I'm waiting for someone just to wake me up  
  
- The Atari's  
  
You were born into an Eden of your very own - wealth, infamousy, and a sisterhood to rival that of the history books.  
  
You don't really remember how it happened, like a snap in your head where you rationalized. Some say you forfeited your beliefs in the name of love, some say you falsified your loyalties because you finally realized Lucius was a load of scum and would forever be such. But your decision wasn't a matter of Black versus the world of compassion, pureblood versus whatever else there is. It was your decision, for you.  
  
Growing up you sacrificed everything, never commited a selfish act. You loaned your toys and braided hair for the millionth time, told stories and cooperated. You were the big sister and took that role, played the part of the model Black girl - smart, beautiful, loyal as Hell to your family. So the one time you went against your selfless ways, you committed a sin unpardonable by your family.  
  
Bella had this way about her, she being four years younger than you yet so powerful. She took yourself and Narcissa by the wrists when she was eight and she led you to the brink of the woods, and ran. Cissa slowly caught on, chasing the sister with such peals and squeals of laughter. You felt so honourable as a big twelve year old that you didn't budge -- that was, until Bella tagged you.  
  
And you ran and ran, mud seeping through shoes that weren't meant to be on the ground playing these rough games. You ran til your throat grew ragged and your lungs threatened to burst, blisters ached everytime you moved your feet an inch. Cissa and Bella had fallen back and you kept going because this blissful happiness you felt, running, felt free.  
  
Very few things could recreate that feeling, and one frightened you so much. There were odd things like getting the answer right in class, a cherry lemonade at Madame Rosemerta's through a straw that made you feel so mature at 13, spilling warm water over your head. The most odd you found when you were 15, fifth year, when your leg accidentally brushed Ted Tonks's in a Prefect meeting, and your eyes locked his, and your breath hitched.  
  
You fell in love with books that liberated you from being a silly little girl and made you the brightest of the Blacks. You fell in love with the bittersweet taste of the cherry lemonade, the way you bathed in the warm water like it was sunlight basking down on you. But when you were fifteen, the only thing you knew of love was Lucius, the way he'd glide into the seat beside you and the way his hand would enclose yours and the way his thin lips would smirk when you told him of your test scores. He was seventeen and made you giddy, but he didn't feel free.  
  
So, though its a long sordid tale, you did fall in love with Ted Tonks. The minute he took your hand (in his apartment a day after Christmas 11:34 PM on his smelly couch) you gave in to a world where being free was the best choice you could've ever made.  
  
Everyone has good days, everyone has bad days, but you cannot know your highest high til you reach your lowest low. You've hit many a low since you've made your decision, and it seems like the eternal chase of your childhood and though Cissa and Bella have fallen, you still race away. You know what it feels like, looks of contempt and looks of loathe, looks of dismay and looks of disdain.  
  
You sacrificed everything you had for the chance of liberation, and you like to think you won. You've got Ted and you've got Nymphadora and though you've looked back and though 'what if?' you still continue on. Two paths diverged in a wood, and you took the one less taken - not only by Cissa but by many a person drawn between loyalties to the person they've always been and the person that they could be. You took a risk and you've been rewarded.  
  
You were born into an Eden of your very own- wealth, infamousy, and a sisterhood rival that of the history books. You tasted the forbidden fruit and fell into a less than perfect reality - your own Eden. 


End file.
